How to Migrate Your Website to a New Web Host in Sri Lanka – Free Migration Guide

The very first thing you must do before any website migration is create a complete backup. This includes all your files and your database.

Back up your website files:

1. Log in to your current hosting cPanel
2. Open File Manager → navigate to public_html
3. Select all files → right-click → Compress → create a .zip file
4. Download the .zip file to your computer

Back up your database:

1. In cPanel, open phpMyAdmin
2. Select your database from the left panel
3. Click Export → choose Quick method → Format: SQL
4. Click Go — your .sql file will download

Head to srilankawebhosting.com/order and sign up for our Unlimited Web Hosting plan at Rs. 5,999/year. Once you complete the payment, you will receive a welcome email within minutes containing:

• ✓ Your new cPanel username and password
• ✓ Your new server IP address (e.g., 123.456.789.0)
• ✓ New nameservers (ns1.srilankawebhosting.com, ns2.srilankawebhosting.com)
• ✓ Link to your new cPanel control panel

Now upload your website files to the new server. You can do this via cPanel File Manager or FTP.

Option A — Via cPanel File Manager (easiest for small sites):

1. Log in to your new cPanel
2. Open File Manager → go to public_html
3. Click Upload → upload your .zip backup file
4. Right-click the .zip → Extract → confirm extraction to public_html

Option B — Via FTP using FileZilla (recommended for large sites):

1. Open FileZilla → enter your new server IP as Host, cPanel username, and password
2. Port: 21 → click Quickconnect
3. On the right panel, navigate to public_html
4. On the left panel, locate your unzipped website files on your computer
5. Drag all files from left to right to upload

Your website needs a database (MySQL) on the new server. You need to create one and import your old data.

Create a new database in cPanel:

1. In cPanel, click MySQL Databases
2. Create a new database — note the database name
3. Create a new database user with a strong password
4. Add the user to the database with All Privileges
5. Note all three: database name, username, password

Import your old database:

1. In cPanel, open phpMyAdmin
2. Select your newly created database from the left
3. Click the Import tab
4. Click Choose File → select your .sql backup file
5. Click Go — your database data will import

If you are migrating a WordPress website, you need to update the database connection details in your wp-config.php file so WordPress knows where to find the new database.

In cPanel File Manager, open public_html/wp-config.php and find these lines:

Replace the values with the database name, username, and password you created in Step 4. Save the file.

This is the most important step for achieving zero downtime. Before you change your domain's DNS, test your website fully on the new server using your computer's hosts file. This lets only you see the new site while visitors still see the old one.

How to edit your hosts file:

On Windows: Open Notepad as Administrator → File → Open → C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts

On Mac/Linux: Open Terminal → type sudo nano /etc/hosts

Add this line at the bottom (replace with your actual new server IP and domain):

Save the file. Now open your browser and visit your domain — it will load from the new server. Check all pages, forms, images, and the checkout (if e-commerce) work correctly.

When testing is complete, remove those lines from your hosts file before Step 7.

Once you are 100% happy your website works on the new server, it's time to go live. You do this by updating your domain's nameservers at your domain registrar (e.g., domains.lk, GoDaddy, Namecheap).

How to update nameservers:

1. Log in to your domain registrar account
2. Find your domain → click Manage DNS or Nameservers
3. Change to Custom Nameservers
4. Enter the nameservers from your new host welcome email:
   ns1.srilankawebhosting.com  &  ns2.srilankawebhosting.com
5. Save changes

You can check propagation progress at dnschecker.org — enter your domain and watch the green ticks appear from different countries.

After DNS has fully propagated (usually within 24 hours), do a final full check of your live website:

Once everything passes, keep your old hosting account active for 3–7 more days as a final safety net. After that, cancel it — you no longer need it.